


Bats In The Belfry

by Tht0neGal666



Category: Batgirl (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Detective Comics (Comics), Gotham Academy (Comics)
Genre: AU, Batgirl!Harper, Batman!Step, Gen, Nightwing!Cass, Oracle!Cullen, Robin!Olive (eventually), basically most of the batfam is off world/injured so they have to hold down the fort, because Steph doesn't want to be here, rawr, teen for swearing, young justice mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-23 21:24:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17087999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tht0neGal666/pseuds/Tht0neGal666
Summary: "Who are you?" A quiet voice asks hours later, Steph drenched in sweat and fists wrapped but still aching something awful. If she weren't a bat she wold have jumped; she was a bit caught up in her head, didn't even hear the girl come in. She couldn't be Batman."I'm the new Batman." She answers with a resigned sigh, turning to face the girl.





	Bats In The Belfry

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! This is a bit late for the Secret Santa, but happy holidays! I'm Secret Santa-ing for Bottomless-Pit-Dweller, and tried to cover as much of their request as I could!  
> we've got:  
> -Stephanie Brown  
> -Cassandra Cain  
> -Harper Row  
> -Batfam  
> -Cass Can x Steph Brown  
> -Batgirl  
> -Characters from Gotham Academy  
> -Batgirls  
> -LGBTQ+  
> -female Robins
> 
> This is set a few years in the future and is a mishmash of cannon; steph was spoiler, batgirl and robin, cass was batgirl and black bat rather then orphan. Bruce is an Old Man and can't Batman very often if at all, and it mostly rotates between his kids; namely Cass, Dick, and Tim, though Duke is excited to start taking his turns within the year and Jason is a work in progress. Babs is Oracle, and has been training Cullen as her second in command. Steph and Cass are dating, and traveled the world on a mission/vacation for about a year and a half, Steph leaving Batgirl to Harper. Harper has only very recently felt confident enough in her place to design a new suit. Damian is insisting less and less on being Batman, and seems more interested in joining Dick as his Flamebird, or maybe stopping vigilante life all together and opening an animal shelter or something. Batman is a significantly better father, and the only reason Steph hasn't been officially adopted is because she's dating Cass. 
> 
> I think thats it. Enjoy!   
> -Inkadoodle

"Hey Steph, can you do me a Solid?" Tim's voice started when she picked up the phone, and she groaned in frustration because that voice was the 'I'm going to ask you do do something you don't want to do' voice, but it was Tim, so it was also the 'You'll do it anyway' voice, and she just wanted A Day Off.

"What's up, Tim?" She sighed, and got gratification from the 'ah' that always accompanied that uncomfortable-guilty cringe he did. Good. If she had to deal with his bullshit, then he probably deserves the discomfort.

"So. Don't hang up-" he says, and, if Steph was stupid enough to believe Tim hadn't done something to remotely disable the Hang Up button on her phone, she definitely would have. Heck, she kinda wanted to try anyway, and he hadn't even said anything yet. "But.Um. So."

"Get to the point, Tim." Steph gritted out, and Tim heaved a sigh of his own.

"So. Dick's off planet with Duke and Babs for some peace talk." He started and yes, she already knew this, and he was clearly and blatantly stalling for time, and she didn't want to deal with this bullshit.

"Yes, Tim. I was there when Ol' Batty went over the plan. You're Batman- sorry for your luck-, Damian's Robin and training that girl from his school- that's honestly kinda cute- and Cass is flying back in to fill in for Nightwing. Cullen gets to try his spot at Oracle. Harper stays Batgirl, I stay awesome, Jason stays Redhood, and Bruce stays in bed on Alfred's orders. Seriously, Get To The Point or I'll just drop the phone and leave." she threatens, and Tim is silent long enough that she almost starts celebrating a rare bullet dodged, because whatever he's trying to ask is not gonna be good. But, Alas-

"Damian snuck onto the ship with the others. And Zeta beams as well as Communications were quickly disabled." Tim doesn't know how to blink first. Figures. She mutters a curse as she figures something else out, fingers turning white in her grip of the phone, because-

"They left a week ago, Tim. Ever think that maybe this is information you're supposed to share with the class?" She nearly growled, because she loved Tim, but he's also the absolute worst sometimes.

"I didn't want to worry anyone! We can't really do anything about it besides hope everything's fine and try to fix it from our end, and The Leauge is already working on that. I've been training Olive, and it's been a quiet week. I didn't need a Robin." He defends himself, and there's a bit to unpack and talk about there, because he must be woried out of his mind and it's bullshit that he didn't tell any of them, but there are more pressing matters.

"I'm sensing a 'But' here." she says hesitantly, reminded of Pandora and her Box.

"But," he obliges, "I'm a little...Shot, right now. Ok. Maybe a lot shot. I'm on bed rest for the foreseeable future. Bart dragged me to Titans Tower because Alfred's so busy with Bruce. I had to blackmail them into letting me have this call instead of passing out." He admits reluctantly and yeah, now that she's listening for it instead of just being angry at him for talking, she can hear his breathing and he's talking a little slow, which is the Bat Equivalent of slurring your words.

"What the hell Tim." she groans, feeling a headache start to form.  "Seriously, spit it out. What do you want? What is this about?" She asked, anger masking worry. 

"You are my last hope." he starts, and that's not good. "I swear Steph, I wouldn't ask if you weren't. I need you to be Batman."

Steph is silent. She freezes. she's clenching one fist hard enough to draw blood with her nails, and the other hard enough to crack the phone in half if it wasn't a BatPhone designed to keep sturdier then a fucking Nokia. It makes sense, given ho angry people get when talking to Bruce. After the seventh that broke being thrown against a wall and the 12 that was snapped in half and the 3rd ground into bits under someone's heel, they went through some revisions. 

"Please Steph. I'll delete that blackmail from Star City, you know the one. I'll give you eternal access to whatever you want. I'll dress in drag and do the Hula. I'm actually begging here. Harper can't be Batman. Jason *laughed* at me when I asked. Cass is dead set on Nightwing, something about a bet. Kate doesn't have time to be Batwoman right now, let alone Batman. No one can get a hold of Azreal. Jim's too old, even with the mech suit. You're the only option." He rants and wow, either pain or drugs is really getting to him because he sounds almost hysteric. 

"Fuck you." she snarls. "Fuck you sideways. Fuck Everyone in this god forsaken family. Fuck Damian in particular, little brat. Fuck you." She spits, because she;s a fighter and this is the best she can do. "Seriously. Fuck You. My revenge will be slow and painful, and you owe me so many things, and I'm dying the BatSuit purple out of spite. All of them. Except Cass's, because I love her. Once you heal, I'm kicking your ass." She grumbles and promises and goes on, but it all boils down to her reluctant defeat.

"Thanks Steph, yes I know I suck, you're the best, Goddess amoung Mortals, yes I know you hate me, sorry steph-" Tim indulges her rant because he's a good friend and a smart guy like that, and she only stops when he actually starts slurring words.

"Go The Fuck To Sleep, Boy Wonder." She growls and he hums a good bye and hangs up. She almost buries her head in her knees and pities herself, but instead goes to the BatCave and works through her anger with a good old fashioned punching bag. 

Fuck This.

\--

"Who are you?" A quiet voice asks hours later, Steph drenched in sweat and fists wrapped but still aching something awful. If she weren't a bat she wold have jumped; she was a bit caught up in her head, didn't even hear the girl come in. She couldn't be Batman.

"I'm the new Batman." She answers with a resigned sigh, turning to face the girl. 

She was taller then Damian but only barely, and allegedly a year or so older. Robin apparently popped up in her room at some point and offered to help her control her powers. Olive didn't know anyone's ID as far as they could tell. Alfred would pick her up, blind fold her, drive her to the cave, and keep an eye on her at all times. Steph hadn't met her yet.

"Another one?" Olive asked, frowning. "How many Batmans are there? You aren't even a man." She pointed out, looking over Steph again, and that was validating as hell. 

"As many as there need to be." She answered with a shrug. "And the next Actual Batman is going to be a girl, so you should probably get over the Weird. This life is so much easier once you get over the Weird." She sighed. "The last Batman is preoccupied, so I'm stepping in. Speaking Of. Wanna help me dye the BatSuit purple?" She asked, anger finally bleeding out to make way for mischief. Highly preferable.

"What?" Olive said, startled, and Steph started to giggle. Poor thing. Only Bats she's met are Red and Robin. Red's great, best Boy Wonder there ever was (though she may be biased), but absolutely no fun when focused on The Mission. Little girl here hasn't been inducted in BatFamily Drama and Shenanigans or anything yet. Steph can Fix That.

"Well, ya know. Batman strong-armed me into this, and I'm pissed at him. So, lets dye the BatSuit purple." She elaborated casually, smirk betraying her casual tone for something more spiteful. The girl stared at her oddly, hesitating a few times before speaking again.

"Do I..Have to?" She asked uncertainly maybe trying to figure out if this was a test or something. Stupid Tim. Steph shrugged again.

"Not if you don't want to. you won't get in trouble for it, though.  It's just an offer." She assures the girl, dropping into cool down exercises.   
"I'll call up Nightwing and Batgirl to help. One of them can watch you if you don't want to participate." She states, texting Cass and Harper with the offer from Batman's BatPhone, getting an affirmative emoji from Cass and a list of expletives and demands for information from Harper. "They'll probably be here in an hour or two, given the travel time from Blud for 'Wing and the end of patrol for BG." 

Olive gaped at her, clearly wrong footed in a few ways. Steph bit her lip in pity and rolled her eyes. "Hey. Wanna train?" She asked, looking up at the girl through some hair that fell out of her haphazardly-done ponytail. "Like, I don't know how to do any of the Meta-Training Red probably put you through, or the discipline stuff Robin's probably offering. But I can, like, start you on an actual work out. Knowing them, they've probably not done that because they're taking it one step at a time and all, but it's about all I can offer. Sorry about that." She almost cringed at the lame offer. Some Batman she'l be. But, she's done enough Bat-Training to not cringe in embarrassment, and she rolled backwards and into a sitting position as she finished stretching.

That seemed to snap Olive out of whatever Dilemma she was having, so at least Steph still had basic people reading skills. Olive needed something easy and routine to either distract from or help work through the weird shit going down. If steph came to the Batcave when she was still new at being Spoiler and there was a new batman that smiled and was trying to get her to fuck up the batsuit, she would have had a similarly short-circuited brain. Olive nodded, and Steph grinned. 

"Great! Lets start simple..."

\--  
Two hours later, Steph was impressed. Olive clearly wasn't a very active person, but she was very stubborn. Steph had to keep an eye out for when she was tiring out, because the girl refused to call a break for herself. Steph did not envy the soreness the girl would wake up with, but such is the cost of Bat Training. 

That was the other thing. The girl clearly wasn't aware that she was slowly being initiated into the Bats, and that was outright amusing. She wondered if this was how Dick felt when she insisted that she wasn't in their weird vigilante cult for years. After dating 2 bats, becoming a reluctant designated babysitter for another, and being added to the 'Exclusive Secret Family Only BatChat', even she had to give up. Steph was curious how long it would take Olive to reach the same conclusion.

Just as they were about to start another round of Sparring, The access request for the Batcave was issued and overwritten, as Harper had her brother let her in. There was Static in Steph's ear, and then the chiper chatter of Cullen gushed through the comm, sounding weird through the Oracle voice modifier. Apparently, he was Stoked to have access to Oracle's systems, and was still finding new features and programs to play with. Babs had even left him a folder of side projects to help out on when he could, and he was scrubbing through security footage for an exhibit where emeralds had been replaced with Kryptonite, trying to determine when it happened. Patrol went well then.

Steph could barely pay attention to the boy, however, as Batgirl herself stormed up to her with a determined air. Steph, who was Batman now, managed not to gulp, but it was a near thing. An angry Harper was never a good thing. 

"Spoiler! What the Hell!" Batgirl seethed, marching up to her. Olive shrunk back, flames flickering on her fingers as she looked to Steph for..something. What? "Since when are you The Big Bad Bat? What are they paying you? Do you need a rescue? Are you a clone? Is the world ending? Do you need a cell in Arkham? What The Fuck Happened to get you here?" the girl asked, each question getting faster as she got closer and Olive got tenser and- oh. Right. She's Batman. Olive hasn't met Batgirl. Batgirl just let herself in. Olive doesn't know if she's a threat.

"Olive, this is Batgirl." She informed quietly, doing the batsign for stand down, because if she was trained by Red Robin for any amount of time, he's gone over basic codes like that with her. Then she turned to Harper, equally put upon. "Since Red got kidnapped by his friends, If I have any say then someone's going broke for my Pay, I really want to say yes but No, Not as far as I know, I really hope not, probably by the end of this but we'll see, and I Ask Myself that question every morning, BG." Steph huffed, her nose itching through her mask. She should probably reapply it, after all that training. it's all sweaty and gross. "Red's gonna have Hell To Pay when he gets back." She swears, offering a handshake and a smile to her friend. "So. Yeah. It's Batman, for now, and I haven't seen you in way too long. How ya doin?" She asked Batgirl, and the girl smiled, all dramatic fury and no bite.

She took the moment to overlook Harper's take on the Batgirl suit; apparently, she designed it mostly herself, with only minimal help from Babs and Alfred. It was much more techy then any other Batgirl, looking very Cyber Punk. Steph laughed as she noticed some newer mods; metal re-textures of some of the suit parts that and her look like an actual Cyborg. most notably, the solid black metal gauntlets, and one lens eye being red and seeming connected to her face. Nice.

"Only fucking you, Bats. Only fucking you have this shit-poor luck. Or. Damn, right, the kid. AM I supposed to stop swearing?" Harper asked reluctantly, noticing Olive and waving. Olive had calmed down a little, and at least didn't look ready for a fight, though she still looked a little scared, maybe confused. Steph didn't know why. She's terrible with kids. Hopefully Cass gets here soon.

"Um. I don't think she cares. I don't care. And I care even less if Red or Big Batty cares, given the situation." Steph grinned, doing a deep Batman voice that all Bats learn to copy fairly-well eventually, almost exclusively for mocking purposes. "Batman allows this." she growls, and Harper starts laughing as Olive jumps at the unexpected noise. 

"Ask." A voice said suddenly from the shadows, and all three of them turned to face it, though only Olive was cautious of it.

There Cass stood, mostly obscured by shadows, full Nightwing get up. She was a bit smaller then Dick, but that just meant that she wore much more under armor. Considering she was just a placeholder Nightwing and she wasn't upset with Dick at the moment, she hadn't changed the costume at all. The BatSuit will not have the same courtesy if she has any say in it.

"Nightwing!" Steph gushed, running over to Cass and crushing her with a hug. Cass let the blonde cling to her, and Steph was grateful, because she was having a really bad day, okay? She didn't want to be Batman. It's not like she could out right say that to Harper or Olive, but she couldn't hide it from Cass if she wanted to, and she really needed her girlfriend right now ok? She pulled leaned a little with a forced smile that Cass looked sad at, running her thumb over Steph's cheek, and that fixed the smile a little.  Nightwing gave Steph a look that clearly said 'we'll talk about this', then turned to Olive, Harper standing a bit to the side with a soft smile.

"Ask." Cass said again, and it was now clear that she was talking to Olive, who had been very quiet since Batgirl arrived. Olive tensed up, staring at her with the confused-maybe-scared face she had looked at Harper with. Steph was more then content to let Cass handle this one and untangled Cass from the hug fully, instead standing half a step behind her and holding Nightwing's hand. Olive floundered a bit before composing herself.

"Ask? Ask what?" she inquired, looking up at Nightwing for what she was supposed to say. Nightwing gave a soft smile and shook her head. 

"You have many questions because you do not understand things. Ask. We don't bite." she explained patiently, tilting her head encouragingly, and Olive relaxed a little, biting her cheek before talking.

"Who's Spoiler? Who's Red? Who are you? How did you get in without us knowing? Isn't the Batcave supposed to be safe?"She blurted, looking between the thee of them. Batgirl and Nightwing looked to the acting Batman for answers, and god this is weird.

"I was Spoiler. It's one of my other hero names. Red is the Batman you met before me; we aren't using his full hero name because it is against ID Protocol to refer to anyone by anything other then their current moniker." She stated, pointedly glaring at Harper, who scoffed but looked away guiltily. "This is the Current Nightwing, and my girlfriend. She has her ways, and telling you would break Security Protocol. The Batcave is very safe." She answered shortly, before groaning and leaning dramatically on Nightwing. "God, I've been Batman for two hours and I'm already passive aggressively scolding Batgirl and lecturing people on protocol. this is a curse. I'm going to rip Red's tongue out and break all of his fingers so he can never ask me for anything ever again." She stated plainly, and Nightwing only nodded along, as if this was a perfectly reasonable plan. Steph smiled, staying where she was a moment longer before popping up like a spring, hands clasped together and a mischievous glint in her eye. 

"Now, for what I've all called you here for today. My first step in the still-in-progress revenge plot for making Me be Batman. We are going to Dye Batman Suit's 1, 2, and 4 purple. Suit 4 shall be fully dyed, while suits 1 and 2 will be more temporarily vandalized. This is an act of protest and revenge on Red specifically, not a call to war. Yet." Steph lectured using her Batman Voice again. Cass smiled, probably seeing how much fun Steph was having, and Olive still looked unsure. "Olive. Are you going to be assisting?" she asked, leaning forward. Olive looked to think it over a bit, ead tilting back and forth, before sighing and nodding.

"I guess. I don't think I'd ever forgive myself for turning something like this down." She grinned, fire (metaphorically) lighting in her eyes. 

"That's the spirit! Follow me!"

Steph wouldn't say it out loud (because that would be as good as admitting defeat), but maybe bing batman wouldn't be...ok well. Yeah. It would still be Bad. But, maybe not The Worst.


End file.
